Fruiting Season, Flowering and Peel Characteristics of Leucaena spp. Analytical Study (B)

During the flowering seasons the species varied greatly and the seasons were seldom repeated (August-October) with only three species and two species (April-June), which means that they continued throughout the months of the year. Three colours of the flower were observed in total with gradient within these three colours distributed to the studied species. In terms of the colour of the peel, two colours were distinguished only in favour of the brown-gray colour, while the forms of cracks on the outer peel surface were divided into three forms. On the other hand, each type was independent when examining the colour of the inner peel. The shape of the cross section of the branch exceeded 81.8% for the circular shape on the angular shape, while two types of branch thickness were recorded and exactly the same for texture. It was possible to observe two forms of branching of the flower-bearing branches, which were very similar to those of the two forms (non-branching and branching) with a large difference between the two forms of the flower's apex, at a rate of 20 times the round shape and 90.9% of the shape of the flower. Two flowers shoots growing types were observed named (Auxotelic and an Anauxotelic). Three main colours, white, yellow and pink were distinguished and the flower head diameter varied widely between (6.5-30 mm). Flowers season seems to be in all of the year. Outer peel thickness also varied from thick to thin to intermediate. Three forms of peel fissures were found and 54.5% to mid-brown colour. Inner peel colour can be a good item to be a key of classification of this tree. Correlation coefficient between peel thickness and outer peel colour was 0.935.

Development and psychometric properties of the general public's attitudes toward advance care directives scale in Portugal

Background: To date, no instrument in Portugal has evaluated the attitudes of the population about advance care directives. This paper describes the development and testing of the General Public's Attitudes Toward Advance Care Directives (GPATACD) Scale.Design and Methods: Methodological study. The development of the instrument was based on a literature review, updated in 2018. Face and content validity were verified by an expert panel and piloted among six participants. Data were collected in an online survey of 1024 Portuguese adults. The obtained data were analyzed using Varimax rotation, while the reliability was evaluated by calculating Cronbach’s alpha.Results: The scale achieves good Item-Content Validity Index (I-CVI) values, between 0.89 and 1.00, and scale-CVI values of 0.91. A principal component analysis generated four dimensions with 26 items as a final scale, with overall Cronbach’s alpha of 0.848.Conclusions: The findings demonstrate that the scale is valid and reliable as a vehicle for assessment of the general public's attitudes toward advance care directives.

Adaptation of "Nicholson McBride Resilience Questionnaire" (NMRQ) in Greek. A reliability and validity study in an epidemiological Greek sample

Introduction: ‘Psychological Resilience’ is one of the key elements in human behavior that interplays with stress in mental disorders and physical illnesses in both healthy and unhealthy populations, regardless of their biopsychosocial background. Therefore, a reliable and valid resilience questionnaire for clinical and research use is of great necessity.Aim: Hence, the present study was conducted in order for the original English version of ‘Nicholson McBride Resilience Questionnaire’ (NMRQ) to be adapted in the Greek population.Methods & Materials: The original English NMRQ consists of 12 items measuring resilience. It is a self-reported questionnaire, while each respective item is measured through a 5-Likert scale point system. The design of the study was developed to firstly translate the original English questionnaire in Greek, and secondly to test the new version upon its ‘item consistency’, ‘internal correlation’, ‘internal consistency’, ‘consistency validity’, and finally perform a ‘factor analysis’ after recruiting a Greek sample.Results: The results show 80% validity (Cronbach’s alpha=.800) of the new Greek version. The number of participants (N= 1,158) provided to the study an ‘a priori’ odds ratio of 1.274, a critical z of 1.6448 and an actual power of 95%. The Greek translation was considered accurate, while the new version maintained a good item consistency.Conclusion: It is proposed that the Greek version of NMRQ may be adapted in the Greek population in clinical and research related to resilience and stress, as well as for any future studies to test-retest its validity and reliability.

Colombian Adaptation of the HIV and Other Sexually Transmitted Infections Knowledge Scale (KSI) in an Adolescent Population

Colombia has one of the highest rates of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and teenage pregnancies among Latin American countries. Knowledge about HIV/AIDS and other STIs has been identified as a factor in promoting healthy sexual behavior. The HIV and Other Sexually Transmitted Infections Knowledge Scale (KSI) is an instrument created in Spain to assess sexual health knowledge in adolescents. In view of the lack of scales that measure this construct in Colombia, this study aims to culturally adapt and validate the KSI for the Colombian adolescent population. The sample was comprised of 866 adolescent school children (458 females and 408 males) aged between 14 and 19 years ( M = 15.97, SD = 1.36) from 12 schools in the cities of Bogotá (n = 467) and Barranquilla (n = 400). Results showed good item psychometric properties and adequate discrimination and difficulty indices. Factorial analysis confirmed a five-dimensional factor structure. The indicators of validity showed significant correlations with constructs related on theoretical grounds. In sum, the study presents a valid and reliable scale for evaluating knowledge about HIV and other STIs in Colombian adolescent population.

Development of a Novel Measure of Informal Caregiver Burnout

Burnout is a concept which has permutated most settings over recent decades. However, due to its roots in occupational research there exists both theoretical and practical gaps to consider when measuring burnout within non-occupational settings, such as informal caregiving. This study developed and validated a measure of burnout for informal caregivers of individuals with Alzheimer’s disease and dementia, the Informal Caregiver Burnout Inventory (ICBI). Theoretical and methodological implications are discussed. Development included a 10-step method for scale development proposed by Boateng and colleagues (2018). Expert feedback on item appropriateness and clarity was collected from 33 caregivers or related professional experts and used to modify the original item-bank. Following this, a national sample of 255 current caregivers was gathered. This survey included the ICBI, two gold-standard measures of burnout, and measures of depression and caregiver burden. Item reduction analysis was used to remove items with poor item-total and inter-domain correlations. The ICBI shows good item-agreement (Cronbach’s alpha= .88) and principles of Item Response Theory were used to measure item- and scale-wide information captured. Convergent validity was then compared against other measures of burnout using Bland-Altman Plots. Divergent validity was similarly assessed by comparing the ICBI to a depression questionnaire. Finally, the predictive validity of each burnout measure was compared to their association with burden and depression. This study suggests that the ICBI may perform adequately as an index of caregiver burnout, and thus is address a methodological and clinical gap in current efforts to understand the dynamics of caregiving.

DEVELOPMENT OF A CHILDREN QUESTIONNAIRE FOR MEASURING CHINESE CHARACTER LITERACY LEARNING SATISFACTION

There are limited reports about development of questionnaire to measure learning satisfaction among young children. In this research, guidelines were listed for developing a questionnaire that gauges Chinese Character Literacy Learning Satisfaction (CCLLS) among 8-year-old children. The research was undertaken based on the responses of 232 children from 11 Chinese national type primary schools (SJKC) of Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia. The CCLLS questionnaire consists of 12 items developed through three dimensions of satisfaction, which are (1) Satisfaction towards Chinese characters writing, (2) Satisfaction towards Chinese characters recognizing, (3) Satisfaction towards the learning in classroom. Rasch analysis was used to examine the item polarity. The result showed point measure correlation was within 0.47 – 0.60. The items were also detected with the outfit mean square in the range of 0.76 – 1.24, indicating CCLLS was fit to measure the children’s learning satisfaction. The raw variance explained by measures (33.3%), the unexplained variance in first contrast (9.1%), with the eigenvalue (1.6%) from the principal component analysis, suggested that CCLLS could be unidimensional. The internal consistency was considered very high with 0.81 in Cronbach’s alpha (KR-20). The result also showed CCLLS has very good item reliability (0.91) with good item separation index (3.23). The person reliability (0.77) was in satisfactory range with moderately good person separation index (1.81). The findings indicated that CCLLS questionnaire could be a valid and reliable tool in measuring Chinese character literacy learning satisfaction among 8-year-old primary school children of SJKC. Keywords: children questionnaire, Chinese Characters Literacy Learning Satisfaction, Rasch analysis, validity and reliability

Pengembangan Tes Matematika dengan Konteks COVID-19 untuk Siswa SMP/MTs Kelas VIII

This study aims to develop a mathematics test with the COVID-19 context to measure the student's skill competencies in grade VIII SMP/MTs. This study was a research development by following the test development procedures: compiling blueprints, writing items, reviewing questions, testing, analyzing the results of trials, and revising. The developed test consists of multiple-choice items with four options. These items were validated content by three experts (teacher, lecturer, and mathematics trainer) and were tested to 86 students. This study developed a mathematics test set with the COVID-19 context consisting of ten items that experts declared valid. Trial of ten items showed two items (numbers 7 and 6), which were not good. Item number 7 was too easy, while item number 6 was not good in the discrimination index. Besides, the two distractors in item number 7 did not work correctly. The estimated coefficient of reliability of the measurement results was quite high, indicated by a coefficient value of 0.658. The items that were not good have been revised by modifying the items so that the index of difficulty and discrimination look good. Useful and revised items were assembled into a mathematics test set for grade VIII students.

Technical Aspects of Automated Item Generation for Blended Learning Environments in Biology

Using two case studies from biology, the article demonstrates and analyses how domain-specific self-learning items with variable content can be generated automatically for a blended learning environment. It shows that automated item generation works well even for highly specific technical properties and that a good item quality can be produced. Evaluations are based on sample exercises from two courses in botany and genetics, each with more than 100 participants.

THE INDIVIDUAL WORK PERFORMANCE SCALE: A PSYCHOMETRIC STUDY AND ITS APPLICATION FOR EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE

Purpose: This research aims to get an individual work performance scale of the modified version which is more acceptable and has a good psychometric property. Methodology: This study was conducted using a modified measuring instrument approach. Researchers use existing theories and then make items according to the context in which this research will be conducted. The advantage of this modification approach is getting a more comprehensive understanding of the subject we are researching. Main Findings: Of the 303 employees that were tested in the research, the modification scale of the individual work performance has a good psychometric property with the criteria of reliability more than 0.8 and the fit model that has a good item with RMSEA score (0.062). Other than that, the modification scale of individual work performance shows a good convergent validity with presenteeism and correlate with job burnout. Applications of this study: The Individual Work Performance Scale has a comprehensive methodology and good psychometric properties. This instrument is appropriate to be the general instrument for seeing the employee situation. In addition, this instrument can also be used as a set of tests that are suitable for use by those who will conduct an assessment of employee performance. Novelty: This scale was made as a form of development from previous research which did not explore and develop forms of assessment that were specific to an employee's performance. There is not much-related research that focuses on many dimensions that are actually important to assess in employee performance.

KARAKTERISTIK BUTIR SOAL: CLASSICAL TEST THEORY VS ITEM RESPONSE THEORY?

This research aimes to describe the characteristic of UAS items theme 1 at the fourth grade of Primary School in Paramasan bawah village according to the item difficulties and discrimination. The sample of this research was 37 students who took the final examination year academic 2018/2019. The objects of this research were question items and the answer sheet of the final exam that obtained from 3 different schools in Paramasan Bawah village. The data analysis technique used in this research was empirical analysis helped by Bilog and Iteman program application. This analysis used to know the characteristic of items based on the Item Response Theory and Classical Test Theory. The result of this research showed the characteristic of UAS items, according to item response theory, 30 items had a good discrimination and 33 items had a good item difficulty, while according to Classical Test Theory: 15 items had a good discrimination and 27 items had a good item difficulty.Keywords: Characteristics of items, item difficulties, discrimination